Private Our Dark Paths

[Tamsin Graves]

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Theme: Coming Home
Tags: Kaila Irons

Her eyes fluttered open and as her vision cleared she saw herself standing outside the governor's estate on Echnos. It felt like she had sleep forever and was waking up from a coma, her eyes felt heavy and her body ached. She had to tell herself to breathe almost like she had forgotten how. Her mind was confused, why was she outside the estate again? How did she get here, the last thing she remembered was leaving Susevfi feeling the ruination of the city. Then, then there was nothing just a long blank darkness.

She looked to her side and Zero was at her side, he looked up at her very concerned. "When did we get here?" She asked him confused. The light in his photo receptor eye though it didn't change it felt like it was judging her with concern. Yet he did not answer as he reached up with one of his tools and buzzed the door.

Why didn't they just go in, they both lived here, she thought to herself. Yet she didn't ask him because she just had this feeling, he would not answer her. In truth Zero did it because he didn't know what to expect Tamsin had both told him Kaila was Dead and Alive. His own communications had been jammed somehow, he suspected Tamsin did it but couldn't prove it.

So, he buzzed at the estate entrance because he did not know if they would be greeted by a livid Kaila which he would be glad to see, or if a new governor had already settled in. Either way the safe bet was just to buzz and wait to see what they got. After all, over a week had passed and that whole time Tamsin led them on some crazy mission to a space station and to Dahrtag. Why they had gone to those two places the droid didn't know and Tamsin hadn't told him. She had acted very strange the whole time too almost like she was a different person entirely.

The droid and the girl just stood at the entrance waiting for whatever waited for them beyond the front doors to home. Tamsin's clothing covered in dirt, blood, and black oil with no answer in sight as to why. She tried to put puzzle pieces together in her mind as she stood there but nothing came. How had her ears healed she must have used the medical droids or bacta but she didn't remember doing it.

 

[Kaila Irons]

Tag: Tamsin Graves

Casualty reports from Sluis Van which would prove useful to her plans, financial documents, logistical forms, Anathemous absentmindedly picked through the stacked datapads and flimsiplast folders.

Until one in particular caught her tired eye.

The governor sluggishly clawed it from the stack and sighed. "Subject: (Re)Missing persons case B113-2". She knew the answer before she'd even opened it, knowing well that she was most likely dead. Truth be told, Kaila only wanted to see Tamsin's attached photo again.

The door rang once, twice, thrice before Kaila tore her eyes from the work in which she'd been engrossed since her apprentice went missing, her way of coping.

She pulled up a security feed on the hardlight display, noting the grainy presence of a small astromech and similarly small figure with their backs towards the camera. OO-series astromechs were still quite common on Echnos due to their former kainite status, and the figure she assumed to be another agent of the empire either sent to discuss logistics on behalf of the wolf or even to request that she cease pestering the ministry of order about the case, using whatever flowery language the non-force sensitive organization must to illustrate their point without their messenger losing her head to a sith blade.

"I'll get it." she muttered into the commlink, dismissing her guards who had better to do.

And so Anathemous donned her cloak, walking lackadaisically through the manor.


When the door first opened, she wore the same uninterested, almost inhuman stare for which she was known for by the public. However the moment Tamsin's face registered in her mind, those yellow eyes— though lacking their usual fire, widened as if she'd seen a ghost.

Kaila knelt, and held her lost apprentice close.

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[Tamsin Graves]

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Theme: Coming Home
Tags: Kaila Irons

The door opened and for a moment Tamsin's dark eyes met Kaila's yellow eyes. It was only a moment, but Tamsin saw tired and weary eyes staring back at her. It took a moment for Kaila to realize it was her standing at the door. Then her master promptly dropped down and embraced her in a tight hug, pulling her in close. It seemed like some stress or burden had been lifted off Kaila in that moment. Tamsin's thoughts whirled about what to say, yet she didn't know what to say she couldn't remember anything after Susevfi and wasn't sure how long she had been gone but it had to be a lot longer than a few hours.

As her master embraced her in the hug, she felt the warmth in Kaila a stark contrast to the cold emptiness the Demon had shown her. She wasn't sure what to believe, the demon who told her there was no place for her or this her master clearly missing her. Hesitantly she wrapped her arms around her master and returned the hug. Then she spoke her voice cracking a little bit as she dwelled on what she had felt of Susevfi.

"I went to save you, but I could not feel you. I thought you died and left me. The…" She stopped herself from saying it allowed she didn't need to burden her master with what the Demon had told her and showed her. Kaila had so much going on and a lot of responsibility, Tamsin felt her problems were so minor compared to what her sister dealt with every day. "How did you beat me back here? I left immediately after…" Again she stopped herself from saying it she didn't want Kaila to know what she was shown or what she felt, she did not deserve the crush pain on her heavy shoulders. She didn't deserve the hate and emptiness that Tamsin felt on Susefvi from all the Demon.

"After the city was destroyed." Again, holding back that she knew it had been Kaila who called for its ruination. Though she tried to control what she said about Susefvi she did let it slip she left after the city fell not before. She had survived its complete annihilation with the demon's protection, but she had been there when the city fell. "Kaila, why did you go there? Why didn't you wait for me? Am I not strong enough to fight at your side?" Tears started form at the edge of her eyes as she hugged her her best friend, she longed for that cold emptiness the demon had shown her rather then dealing with the pain in her heart and knowledge of what she knew her master had done.

 

[Kaila Irons]

Tag: Tamsin Graves

"I..." Kaila held on a little tighter, shedding a tear at the accusation.

"Someone very important to me, they threatened to execute her-" her voice cracked.

"There was no time! Else I would have taken every ally available..."


She pulled back, a hand on either of Tamsin's shoulders as she looked her with mixed horror and questioning, shaking her head as she tried to form words to no avail until it finally came.

"What happened, Tamsin...? It's been weeks! I contacted the ministry of order, dispatched my droids across the outer rim to find you, to no avail!"

"And I still-"

Her eyes went wide, and her voice silent.

There had never been a time when they could not feel one another across the vast emptiness of space through their mysterious bond, not since they'd taken their oath. It wasn't until she arrived in that fanged-god forsaken city that she could no longer feel sense her apprentice, and that had not changed since she left. It horrified her then, and to see her now, but not feel her...

It horrified her now, as well.

"...I still can't feel you." she muttered.

Kaila slowly let go, stumbling to her feet with the same horrified look of uncertainty across her pale face, taking a step back.

"Why can't I feel you...?"

Her hands gloved shook as she looked them over, her chest rising and falling rapidly.

"...is this real?"

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[Tamsin Graves]

Theme: Coming Home
Tags: Kaila Irons

The words Kaila spoke, Tamsin didn't know how to reply. She understood them but was having a hard time accepting them and processing them. To her if Kaila had died on Susefvi her whole world would have been destroyed for this Important person she did not know.

As Kaila pulled away but kept her hands on Tamsin's shoulders, Tamsin was able to see right into her masters teary eyes at eye level. It was the first time in front of her she had seen her master cry. There was also a confusion and a seeking of words to be spoken in Kaila.

"What happened, Tamsin...? It's been weeks! I contacted the ministry of order, dispatched my droids across the outer rim to find you, to no avail!"

"Weeks?"

She questioned it felt like maybe a day at most to her. As she utter those words Zero sputtered into a long string of beeps and bwoops. His tone was agitated and frustrated, screaming about the weeks Tamsin had been missing calling her a crazed maniac. It was fast something about a space station and a tomb world. Also how Tamsin had sabotaged comms on the ship and somehow scrambled his own communications so he couldn't contact Kaila or anyone she might know.

Tamsin looked at the droid at her side. "I don't remember any of that, I just remember leaving Susefvi." She said with her sobbing voice that cracked as she spoke. As she said it she felt her sister's warm touch pull away from her. Tamsin turned to quickly back to Kaila as she grabbed for her sister's arm.

"I am real!" She screamed though not intentionally it just came out loud. "I am real." Her tone lowered a bit. "I don't know if it was the demon or something on that world but I couldn't…..can't feel you either. I thought you were dead….I thought I failed to save you…but the demon showed me the truth….it told me you didn't care no one did….that like it I am not apart of this world…I am alone." Fear welled up in her int hat moment as she blurted out what the demon had revealed to her. Yet as she said those words to Kaila a faint spark of there connection ignited it was weak but there. "I…I didn't want to believe it but…"